Pages

Monday, 19 February 2018

Arsenal to wear red shorts in Carabao Cup final against Manchester City

Arsenal FC hsve not worn all red jersey for almost 40 years, Arsenal will do so for the second time in three months when they face Manchester City in the Carabao Cup final.

The Gunners will be wearing red shorts for Sunday's match at Wembley, as the EFL confirmed, with City in their full sky blue and white home kit.

The Gunners will be in red shorts so not to clash with City's white and, as Football.London reports, will hope to fare better that last time they were in all-rouge.

That was at West Brom on New Year's Eve, when Alexis Sanchez looked to have scored the winner from a deflected free-kick only for Calum Chambers to concede a controversial penalty. Jay Rodriguez converted from the spot to seal a point for the Baggies.

Arsenal fans react to new record-breaking Emirates sponsorship deal in two very different ways

That was the first time in almost 40 years since Arsenal's kit, aside from white sleeves, was totally red.

Red shorts were a regular sight for the club in the 1970s when the standard white was thought to clash with others teams’ shorts.

The alteration only happened once at Gunners’ old Highbury ground though, a Boxing Day fixture in 1970 against Southampton when white shorts didn’t stand out against the snowy pitch.

However, the club revealed the decision behind the bold kit change for the trip to the Hawthorns was due to a possible clash.

As part of their standard home kits, both Arsenal and West Brom wear white shorts, meaning that the players on each team could confuse each others’ legs in the heat of the action.

Interestingly, there had been no such problem in recent years, with Gunners playing in red shirts and white shorts on numerous occasions at the Hawthorns.